ine said quietly. "We all know it's
infernal--this doing nothing."

"He's been struck by Earthlight," another man laughed. "Commander, I
told you not to let that guy Wilks out at night."

A rough but good-natured lot of men. Jolly and raucous by nature in
their leisure hours. But there was too much leisure here now. Their
mirth had a hollow sound. In older times, explorers of the frozen
Polar zones had to cope with inactivity, loneliness and despair. But
at least they were on their native world. The grimness of the Moon was
eating into the courage of Grantline's men. An unreality here. A
weirdness. These fantastic crags. The deadly silence. The nights,
almost two weeks of Earth time in length, congealed by the deadly
frigidity of space. The days of black sky, blazing stars and flaming
Sun, with no atmosphere to diffuse the Sun's heat radiating so swiftly
from the naked Lunar surface that the outer temperature still was
cold. And day and night, always the beloved Earth disc hanging poised
up near the zenith. From thinnest crescent to full Earth, then back to
crescent.

All so abnormal, irrational, disturbing to human senses.

With the mining work over, an irritability grew upon Grantline's men.
And perhaps since the human mind is so wonderful, elusive a thing,
there lay upon these men an indefinable sense of disaster. Johnny
Grantline felt it. He thought about it now as he sat in the room
corner watching Wilks being forced into the plaget game, and he found
the premonition strong within him. Unreasonably, ominous depression!
Barring the accident which had disabled his little spaceship when they
reached this small crater hole, his expedition had gone well. His
instruments, and the information he had from the former explorers, had
enabled him to pick up the catalyst vein with only one month of
search.

The vein had now been exhausted; but the treasure was here--enough to
supply every need on his Earth! Nothing was left but to wait for the
_Planetara_. The men were talking of that now.

"She ought to be well midway from Ferrok-Shahn by now. When do you
figure she'll be back here and signal us?"

"Twenty days. Give her another five now to Mars, and five in port.
That's ten. We'll pick her signals in three weeks, mark me!"

"Three weeks. Just give me three weeks of reasonable sunrise and
sunset! This cursed Moon! You mean, Williams, next daylight."

"Ha! He's inventing a Lunar language. You'll be a Moon man yet."